Chicago Mayor and former White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel
expressed blunt words about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
this weekend at a closed forum in Washington. Though the rules of the
meeting with reporters, Mideast scholars and politicians were that
remarks were off-the-record, a Netanyahu rival during his own speech
blurted out the gist of Emanuel’s angry criticism of the Israeli prime
minister.
It was the headline Monday of the Israeli paper Yediot Aharonot, which reports (Blaze translation of hard copy of paper):

The tension between the prime minister and the American
president is mounting. Rahm Emanuel, someone close to President Obama,
over the weekend sharply attacked Netanyahu over his support for Mitt
Romney and said: “This man Netanyahu bet on the wrong man – and lost.”

Simply stated, Emanuel accused Netanyahu of meddling in the American
elections. Though this was a popular theme in the liberal Israeli media
leading up to November 6, the prime minister never publicly endorsed
either candidate.

Netanyahu and Obama’s tense meeting in May 2011 (AP photo)

Speaking at the closed meeting on the sidelines of the Saban Forum,
Emanuel reportedly recalled the tense Oval Office meeting last year
between Obama and Netanyahu in which Netanyahu was accused of “lecturing”
the president by explaining why Israel cannot withdraw to
“indefensible” 1967 borders and maintain its security. Only a day before
that meeting, Obama called for the 1967 borders to be the boundary of a Palestinian state, the first president to endorse that idea.

Emanuel slammed Netanyahu for doing what he said no White House guest
had previously done. According to a Yediot translation, he said: “It’s
unfathomable what happened there. It was unforgettable. That’s not how
one behaves.” Emanuel reportedly added that the president is no longer
willing to accept disrespectful treatment from Netanyahu. The paper says
he called Netanyahu ungrateful in light of the Obama administration’s
generous aid to Israel.
Yediot reports that Emanuel further criticized the Netanyahu
government for approving 3,000 housing units in the West Bank and
eastern part of Jerusalem Friday in response to the Palestinians’
successful bid to upgrade their status at the UN to non-member observer
state.
Quoting unnamed sources, The New York Times reports that the Israeli
housing approval “came as a rude shock” to President Obama. The New York
Times’ Mark Landler writes:

Privately, officials expressed deep frustration that
Israel’s action came after Israeli officials had spent days playing down
the effect of the Palestinian bid and suggesting that they would only
employ harsh countermeasures if the Palestinians used their enhanced
status to challenge Israel in the International Criminal Court.
One official said building settlements in E1 could be an
“irreversible step” for the peace process. While Israel informed the
United States before making the announcement, as it has before other
such announcements, it clearly caught administration officials off
guard.

Emanuel’s off-the-record statements were disclosed by former Israeli
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, a rival to Netanyahu who hasn’t yet
announced if he plans to run for January elections. The New Yorker’s
David Remnick – a Netanyahu critic himself — writes:

Olmert also violated the rules of the conference by
dragging something that was off the record onto the record. He
accurately, if generally, described how, earlier in the day, Rahm
Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago and Obama’s former chief of staff, had
spoken angrily and bluntly about the way Netanyahu has repeatedly
betrayed the friendship of the United States, lecturing Obama in the
Oval Office and now, after the U.S. had underwritten the Iron Dome
anti-missile system, supported the operation in Gaza, and voted Israel’s
way in the U.N., embarrassing the Obama Administration by taking
punitive actions against the Palestinian Authority. After describing
Emanuel’s remarks, Olmert went on to agree with them.

Palestinians oppose the building of Jewish housing in east Jerusalem
and the West Bank – known biblically as Judea and Samaria – because they
want to establish their state on that same territory. Israel
established its capital in Jerusalem and insists it will never again
split the city in two as it was between 1948 and 1967.
Israel National News spoke to pro-Netanyahu sources who suggest Emanuel himself is meddling in Israeli elections, that is, the timing of his remarks one month before Israelis go to the polls “is not coincidental.”